How Tesco Ruined the UK Wii U Launch

Tesco, the 3rd biggest retailer in the world have massively screwed up the launch of the Wii U console with numbers of customers complaining of deliveries not arrive, being told the console has been sent, not sent and has gone missing from their systems. Us included. We explain the story so far along with twitter and facebook posts showing how Tesco have badly handled this situation.
(Wii U)

Most of those games are ports people have already played. I don't know about you, but I don't have the money to blow away on multiple copies of the same game just to try out a different control scheme. If I wanted a different control scheme, that's what accessories are for.

SO yeah These are all launch games 5 of which are 9.0 or greater. All of these scores are from IGN, I could have looked around but chose only IGN, they usually give pretty good reviews. They did however Give Zombi U a 6.1 and I happen to LOVE the game. I feel bad for these people who were looking forward to their new baby, as it IS a great system. Its so funny how people, who more than likely have not even played these games on Wii U disagree..LOL I know that the Wii U is a great system. I also know it does things my PS3 does not do. I still like My PS3, but I really am enjoying Wii U.

Why is it that people consider BLOPS2 and AC3 as games that have been out for a while? Lump it in with Mass Effect 3, Batman, and Madden?

If they come out in the same general area, then you pick which one you want.

I have a 360 and a PS3 as well as a GTX 670 PC and a Wii U.

Assassin Creed 3....PC BLOPS2 Wii U

So in both cases I didn't buy 'the early one'. Because I can wait a few weeks.

Anyone that can't wait three weeks to get a version they might like more, whether it's the PC for the best graphics, or the Wii U version to try it out as well as the gamepad would be a pretty sad person.

Besides it seems if they ordered any of these from Tesco, they wouldn't be getting them to xmas anyways.

Small update, Tesco are offering a whole £10 Gift card to say sorry for all of this. Bit insulting really. Also All the messed up orders will be dispatched tomorrow but won't arrive till the 10th of December for some reason.

Or they could deliver the order they promised these 50 customers would arrive on friday and provide the correct information. Their customer service only offers an 0845 number at 16p a minute. That adds up very quickly.

It is understandable people are upset but technology isn't full proof and these kind of mistakes can happen in such a large company, the fact that they are compensating you from something that is most likely machine error and not thier fault you really should stop complaining.

If it is coming before Christmas then a lot of people will be relieved, it's not like they won't be delivered.

It's not machine error. You just said that their entire order, processing, and delivery process are all automated and that it's no one's fault for that. There are people hired to make sure things like this don't happen, they are supposed to check up on these things. It's most definitely human error and as far as CS is concerned they are very poorly trained with a huge lack of communication between departments. This isn't some machine's fault.

Sure, mistakes happen, orders go missing etc. That would be acceptable but for 4 days they have told customers their order is 100% sent, then emailed saying its not sent and then say it was sent. Thats the main issue with this story, the horrible communication Tesco have provided.

If they had come out on Saturday and said 'Whoops, we screwed up, we'll fix it asap' i think that would have been acceptable. Instead we got 4 days of random answers, being fobbed off and then finally £10 on a gift card (not cash) and the 'promise' the console will get to us on the 10th. Its too little to late on top of a huge screw up.

Tesco is really starting to go down the pan. I have been shopping with them for years but 2 months ago I decided to go with Asda and I was shocked at how much cheaper they were and how much better quality there food was.

Ive had the same issue with delivers as well where they have been late or turned up the day after.

I do think Tesco need to sort there services out and quick as they could really start to see more and more people shop somewhere else.

I opted for a 1 yr sim only Tesco phone contract - disaster struck when they ported my number and gave it to someone else. 3 months of no service, customer service smiles but do nothing. Wasn't getting anywhere so terminated the contract. Not even an apology, and when I was finally offered a small amount of compensation it never materialized into real cash.

Earlier this year, I checked their website for a price on Portal 2. When I visited the store, it turned out that the price was £12 more than advertised online. When I confronted the staff and the manager regarding this, I was told that the store and the website are "two separate entities" (despite sharing the same name) and that I must order it to get the advertised online price.

This is where it gets stupid. They offered to order it for me to collect in store at the advertised price. Since the game was in stock on the shelf, I asked if I could buy the one they had at the online price and then they could just use the order to replace the one I had bought. After all, the end result is the same. But no, they wouldn't do that.

I told the manager outright that this policy is bullshit, after which he wasn't willing to discuss it further.

I sent a complaint by e-mail and got a call a few days later from the head office. They made the same excuses about "two separate entities" and the discussion basically went the same way as it did with the store manager.

In the end, I didn't even get a £10 gift card for my troubles, so those who ordered the Wii U can consider themselves lucky.

It might also be worth mentioning that I ordered my Wii U Deluxe from Amazon with free Super Saver delivery. It arrived on the morning of the release day. I also only paid £199 for it.

"Earlier this year, I checked their website for a price on Portal 2. When I visited the store, it turned out that the price was £12 more than advertised online. When I confronted the staff and the manager regarding this, I was told that the store and the website are "two separate entities" (despite sharing the same name) and that I must order it to get the advertised online price."

Tesco aren't alone on this. GAME do it. Actually almost every retailer does this. Online prices are often cheaper than the shop price. Its because online they have a massive amount of stock but in the shop their is limted stock room and shelf room. So less are sold/can be sold before new stock has to be ordered. Also online they are in direct competition with the likes of amazon. The shops arent so indirect competition so they tend to have a different price (they also need to accomindate upkeep of the shop/ saleries....

You're doing exactly what they were doing. Don't explain their working processes to me because I don't give a damn. The internal workings of a company is none of my concern as a consumer.

What I do give a damn about is buying a product at the price that they advertise it for. If they cannot deliver the product at the advertised price, they should either not advertise at that price or they should not use the same "Tesco" name for what is essentially two different entities because that is misleading.

I also do not care whether other retailers do it. That doesn't make it right or acceptable. If that is the case, then they are all wrong too.

If they can't get it right, then screw 'em; I'll just stick with Amazon. They just won't get my money any more.

If I had been shopping for groceries, I would have walked out and left my shopping trolley full in the middle of the store, so they would have to pay someone to put everything back on the shelf to REALLY waste their time.

Maybe next time I'll do that - might be good as a threat in case they won't co-operate and do what they're supposed to.

While I think the store should have matched the price, it sounds to me like you were being an annoying, and possibly difficult customer. If you used foul language then it only furthers my suspicions. Being nice to the people that work in these stores will offer greater success in the future.

I've worked in retail and food service, and I can tell you when people go and tell of their bad experiences, they always leave out the fact they were complete asses to the employees.

Seriously, don't be childish. The manager isn't going to suffer because you leave a cart out for one of their minimum wage employees go and put away. In the end it only hurts the other customers that may need help, and increases costs to run the store. The only point your proving is that they were right to ignore you.

"Tesco don't care about, gamers, or games, or even profit from games, its all about just pulling in more customers to their stores"

That can be spun

The local gaming dedicated stores don't care about, gamers, or games, or even profit from games, its all about just pulling in more customers to their stores.

Each store is looking to maximise profts and bring more people into their stores. No company cares so don't think your local gaming store cares. What happened with Tesco is a collosal cluster F... Something went wrong down the line. Its just bad it happened with such a big launch. Hopefully it wont happen again and I assume some heads will roll.

Thought it odd they had no wii u on the shelf when I went in, not even a place where it would be.

I remember when I was waiting for Dirt 3 to release they had a massive stack of them on the shelf as #1 in their new releases list well over a week before release. Took it to the desk but no luck, the dude's till didn't let him sell it but they did give me 10% off on release day for the "inconvenience".

There is just something about buying games from supermarkets... it's just not the same.

This seems a bit like a conspiracy. Who doesn't want WiiU to do well in the UK? And why all the confusion? Shouldn't there be a definitive answer to all of this? It makes no sense why there's so much runaround, the truth is yet to be revealed.